It's quite easy to demonstrate petroleum's latent energy by oxidizing it through combustion. ATP provides energy for nearly every cellular reaction in the body. It obviously has a significant amount of latent energy. Is it possible to demonstrate liberating ATP's latent energy through a combustion style chemical reaction? I assume the barriers to answering this type of question have to do with engineering the infrastructure offered by a living cell. Given the current struggles to find new sources of energy and battery technology, it would seem to be rewarding to move these reactions out of a living organism.
Is it possible to create an ATP Candle?
Thx, Ben
N.B.: Appreciate the grace in regards to being off topic. It was an honest question and and I've learned a little more about ATP. Is there an analog to Biostar for next time? Googled N.B. and learned a little Latin. I'm going to punt on the water + ATP, and guess it has something to do with ATP hydrolysis.
This is a (bio)chemistry question and I would normally close it as off-topic for this site. However, as an ex-biochemist who used to work in the field of bioenergetics (basically, "how cells make ATP"), I cannot resist making a comment. Other moderators, feel free to close :)
The short answer is that ATP does not contain "a significant amount of latent energy." In fact, there is nothing remarkable, in terms of bond energy, about the phosphate anhydride bonds that are broken during hydrolysis. This is the so-called "myth of the high-energy phosphate bond", described in the classic textbook on the subject by Nicholls and Ferguson. Here is the relevant excerpt at Google Books.
In other words: cells have evolved processes which generate ATP, driving the ATP/ADP mass action ratio away from equilibrium and making those reactants suitable as sources of cellular energy. Other reactants could perform equally as well, but for some reason it's ATP/ADP that nature selected very long ago.
I also thought that this is off-topic, but then, where should such questions be asked? I know of biology.stackexchange.com, but that site is far too broad in scope imo (can ask anything from duck behavior to cell biology there). I think that the general competence for genomics, molecular biology and biochemistry question is higher on BioStar than on a single general biology forum. Do you know of a QA site dedicated to molecular biology?
I don't know of a good site; there is a biochemistry tag at the chemistry StackExchange site.